Sarah Heger: Why no amends to Lucile Berkeley from CU?

Posted:
03/22/2018 07:25:25 PM MDT

I am amazed that there wasn't a collective cry of outrage from the CU faculty and her fellow graduates when the first black woman to graduate from CU was not allowed to walk in commencement in 1918 ("First black woman to graduate honored," Daily Camera, March 20).

That she was not allowed to walk on to the stage and accept her degree in person is appalling. A university, after all, is supposed to be a seat of learning and enlightenment !

What is more appalling is that Lucile Berkeley, the daughter of freed slaves, was born in Denver in 1884 and died in Denver at the age of 105 in 1989, yet no amends were made to her during her long life. Why was she not invited to accept her degree in person while she was still alive so that she would feel some consolation, and CU wipe out at least some of its shame and culpability?

That she majored in German and taught all her life is further proof of the extent of her achievement.

Can anyone please explain why someone else will accept her degree on her behalf 29 years after her death? It may bring some consolation to us, but what consolation can it bring to her?

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